Tourney starts tonight for two local teams

Wednesday

Feb 27, 2008 at 12:01 AM

By JON HAGLOF

By JON HAGLOF

Staff Writer

Look for local courts at Dartmouth and Westport high schools to be at fever pitch tonight and tomorrow night as the MIAA basketball tournament kicks off for three teams with high hopes for the post-season.

Tonight, two games are on tap.

In the girls Division 4 South Tournament, the sixth-seeded Westport Lady Wildcats (12-8) host eleventh-seeded Hull (11-9) in first-round action. Tip time is scheduled for 7 p.m. at Westport High School.

"We don't know much about them, so we're kind of going in cold," said head coach Glenn Lincoln on Monday night. "We know they've got a couple of girls who can score, but that's about all we know. So we'll just have find out what we can and be ready to play Wednesday."

The Wildcats finished the season strong by winning three of their final four games, likely earning the first-round home game with the late season push. They are led by junior Kate Farias, who's averaging 15 points and 10 rebounds a game.

With a win, Westport will play the winner of tonight's Provincetown (#14) at Nantucket (#3) game.

Also scheduled for a 7 p.m. tip this evening, fourth-seeded Dartmouth (16-4) hosts thirteenth-seeded Mansfield (13-7) in round one of the boys Division 2 South tourney.

The Indians are coming off the school's first Old Colony League basketball title, a co-championship shared with Bridgewater Raynham. And the team recently got a good tourney-type tune-up with a pair of games in the Matt Tournament at Taunton High School. At the Matt tourney, the Indians ran to a 20-point blowout win over Southeastern and lost by only 4 points to Brockton in the finals.

Tomorrow night, the Westport boys, the 2007-08 Mayflower Large Division champs, take the floor for what is hoped to be the first of many.

At 19-2, the Wildcats picked up the number one seed in the Division 4 South tourney. With that, they will host the winner of a preliminary round game between Blue Hills (#16) and Diman (#17), both teams which suffered a pair of losses to Westport already this season.

After advancing through to the South finals last year, and losing a good deal of graduating talent from that team, the high perch at the top of the South bracket is still something of a surprise for the Wildcats, who surpassed all expectations by toppling Mayflower favorites Southeastern and Avon to take the league prize.

"To go 19-2 was pretty unexpected," said head coach Scot Boudria. "But these kids worked hard all summer and they deserve it. Coaches can do very little if the kids don't go out and do the hard work to get better. And these kids did all the work.

"But we still have a lot of work to do. If we're going to beat the best teams in Division 4, then we have to find ways to get better right now."

The bracket's top four includes Southeastern and Avon. And in the fifth spot, Cathedral High School looms large. Cathedral easily defeated Westport last year in the South final and went on to win the Division 4 State Championship, their second straight.

In theory, the Wildcats should be ready for the tourney spotlight. The team fought through three overtime games in the regular-season, winning two, and seniors Nick Jagoe and Jordan Carvalho are tourney tested from last year's run.

"I'd like to think we're pretty well battle tested, with the three overtime games," said Boudria, "but in the tournament you still have to go out and play well and make good decisions under pressure.

"I don't really like to think of it as pressure, because it's supposed to be fun. But it's a voice in the back of you head that says if you don't do it now, if you don't play well now, you won't be back tomorrow."